“But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.” Matthew 24:37-39

What will it be like when Jesus returns? Jesus Himself tells us it will be like it was in the days of Noah. People will be eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage — in other words, carrying on with life as usual and enjoying the pleasures of this life — and then the end will come and carry them all away in God’s judgment!

Peter, in his epistles, tells us that Noah was “a preacher of righteousness” (2 Pet. 2:5) and that only “a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water” (1 Pet. 3:20).

As a “preacher of righteousness,” Noah, while he was preparing the ark — possibly for as long as 120 years (cf. Gen. 6:1ff.) — was calling upon the people of his antediluvian world to repent of their sins and believe in the promise of the Gospel — that God would send the Seed of the woman to be a sacrifice for sin and so undo the damnable work of Satan when he deceived Eve and brought about the fall of our first parents, Adam and Eve (Gen. 3:15).

And how many believed Noah’s message? How many repented of their sinful ways and believed the promise of God to send a Savior? Only eight souls!

We can only imagine the ridicule and rejection which Noah and his family suffered. He warned of God’s judgment in a worldwide flood in a day when, according to the Scriptural record, God may yet have only watered the earth with a mist (Gen. 2:5-6). He called upon people to repent and look to God’s promise in faith for mercy, but few saw the need to repent and believe the Gospel. Some possibly even pointed out to Noah the small size of his church — only eight souls. Certainly, the rest of the world couldn’t be wrong! And, it is likely that there were many who believed in God; they just didn’t see their need to repent and give up the things of this world to join Noah and his little church of eight souls on the strange-looking ark Noah and his sons had built.

And then the flood came…. Who was saved? Only Noah, his wife, and his three sons and their wives — only those who forsook this world and, in faith, boarded the ark! Who perished? All who failed to repent of their sinful ways and believe the promise of the Gospel!

What will it be like when Jesus returns and this world is judged? It will be like the days of Noah! People will be busy with their lives, eating, drinking, marrying, raising their families, enjoying life in this world, and then the end will come! “Every eye will see Him…” (Rev. 1:7).

And, like Noah, there are preachers of righteousness yet today warning of God’s impending judgment and calling upon all to repent of their sinful ways and believe the promise of the Gospel — that “when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons” (Gal. 4:4-5); that “Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3-4); that through faith in Him, we receive God’s mercy and are justified and forgiven and given eternal life (Rom. 3:21-28; John 3:14-16).

As in the days of Noah, people reject God’s call to repent and believe the promise of the Gospel. They may believe in God but they don’t see a need to repent and look to Christ in faith. They continue on in the ways of this world. They don’t believe that God would actually condemn them to hell; or they look at the true visible church in this world and say its too small, its quarters are too tight and restrictive.

And then the judgment comes…. “The Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. These shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, when He comes, in that Day, to be glorified in His saints and to be admired among all those who believe, because our testimony among you was believed” (2 Thess. 1:7-10).

And what will be the result? “He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned” (Mark 16:16). Those who repent of their sins and believe, being joined to Christ in His death and resurrection through Baptism, receive everlasting life. Those who refuse to repent and believe the promises of the Gospel will be condemned to the everlasting fires of hell!

Today is so very much just like the days of Noah!

O righteous and holy God, have mercy upon my soul and grant that I live in continual repentance and faith, looking for that day when Christ, my Savior, returns to execute judgment upon this wicked world and to receive into glory all who look to Him in faith for the forgiveness of sins and life eternal. Amen.

[Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.]

“Now so it was that after three days they found Him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard Him were astonished at His understanding and answers. So when they saw Him, they were amazed; and His mother said to Him, ‘Son, why have You done this to us? Look, Your father and I have sought You anxiously.’ And He said to them, ‘Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?’ But they did not understand the statement which He spoke to them.” Luke 2:46-50 (Read Luke 2:41-52)

It is amazing, isn’t it? Rather than returning with his parents and running with the other boys his age on their journey home, what did the 12-year-old Jesus do? After three days, He was still in Jerusalem, in the temple, sitting among the teachers of God’s Word, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard Jesus were astonished at His understanding and answers.

Some would imagine that Jesus, because He was and is the Son of God, was lecturing the teachers of the law. But it doesn’t say that. Instead, He was listening to them and asking them questions. We must remember that though Jesus had all knowledge, He humbled Himself and studied and learned the Scriptures just as we are enjoined to do by God in His Word (cf. Phil. 2:5-8; Col. 3:16; 2 Tim. 2:15; 3:14-17).

As Jesus said (v. 49), He was about His Father’s business. He was learning and studying God’s Word. His delight was in the law of the LORD, and in His law He meditated day and night (Psalm 1:2). He loved the LORD God with all His heart and with all His soul and delighted in learning God’s Word.

In the commandments (Ex. 20 and Deut. 5), we are told to “Sanctify the Holy Day.” Luther explains this in his Small Catechism: “We should fear and love God that we do not despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.” And if you wish to see what obedience to this commandment looks like, look at Jesus!

The fact that He delighted in the LORD God and His Word and sought Him with the whole heart (cf. Psalm 37:4; 119:2) amazed His parents, and it amazes us too because we do not — as we are by nature since the fall — have such love for God or the desire to learn of Him and His ways. What would you have been doing at 12 years old? What do you do even yet today?

To be honest with you, I’ve heard complaints about sermons which are too long but seldom that they are too short. I’ve not had church members suggest we stay on into Sunday afternoons or, much less, into extra days to dig deeper into the Bible and consider its teaching. Seldom does anyone suggest we have more services, but sometimes people suggest we have less. Yet, if we loved the LORD God with all our heart and soul and delighted in His Word, we just might do as Jesus did — continue on at church for days in the study of the Scriptures.

We come so far short of God’s commandments, but Jesus’ love for the Father and for the Word of God is evidence of His holy life in our stead. Jesus fulfilled God’s commandments for us and then suffered and died on the cross and rose again that He might bear our punishment and win for us forgiveness and life everlasting in fellowship with God the Father.

When we acknowledge our sinfulness and our failures to keep God’s laws and look in faith to Jesus and His life and death in our stead, we obtain mercy and receive forgiveness from God and life eternal (1 John 1:7 — 2:2; John 3:14ff.; Psalm 32:1-6). Only through faith in Christ Jesus can we return to God and live.

And, having God’s pardon and forgiveness, as well as His promise of eternal life, we will want to devote ourselves to the diligent use of the Word and Sacraments that we might be strengthened and preserved in the true faith unto life everlasting.

Again, I remind you of the summary of Scriptural teaching found in the Formula of Concord, Solid Declaration: “13] Therefore, if we wish to think or speak correctly and profitably concerning eternal election, or the predestination and ordination of the children of God to eternal life, we should accustom ourselves not to speculate concerning the bare, secret, concealed, inscrutable foreknowledge of God, but how the counsel, purpose, and ordination of God in Christ Jesus, who is the true Book of Life, is revealed to us through the Word, 14] namely, that the entire doctrine concerning the purpose, counsel, will, and ordination of God pertaining to our redemption, call, justification, and salvation should be taken together; as Paul treats and has explained this article Rom. 8:29f.; Eph. 1:4f., as also Christ in the parable, Matt. 22:1ff., namely, that God in His purpose and counsel ordained [decreed]: 15] 1. That the human race is truly redeemed and reconciled with God through Christ, who, by His faultless [innocency] obedience, suffering, and death, has merited for us the righteousness which avails before God, and eternal life. 16] 2. That such merit and benefits of Christ shall be presented, offered, and distributed to us through His Word and Sacraments. 17] 3. That by His Holy Ghost, through the Word, when it is preached, heard, and pondered, He will be efficacious and active in us, convert hearts to true repentance, and preserve them in the true faith. 18] 4. That He will justify all those who in true repentance receive Christ by a true faith, and will receive them into grace, the adoption of sons, and the inheritance of eternal life. 19] 5. That He will also sanctify in love those who are thus justified, as St. Paul says, Eph. 1:4. 20] 6. That He also will protect them in their great weakness against the devil, the world, and the flesh, and rule and lead them in His ways, raise them again [place His hand beneath them], when they stumble, comfort them under the cross and in temptation, and preserve them [for life eternal]. 21] 7. That He will also strengthen, increase, and support to the end the good work which He has begun in them, if they adhere to God’s Word, pray diligently, abide in God’s goodness [grace], and faithfully use the gifts received. 22] 8. That finally He will eternally save and glorify in life eternal those whom He has elected, called, and justified.”

And, I challenge you to devote yourself to the regular use of the Means of Grace, to regular attendance at the services of God’s House and to regular use of the Sacraments, to studying the Scripture and the teaching of Holy Scriptures at home, to the reading and study of Luther’s Small Catechism and looking up the Scriptures and prayerfully considering the truths of God’s Word that you might, by the gracious working of the Holy Spirit through Word and Sacrament, become firmly established in the true faith and continue in it unto life everlasting (cf. 2 Tim. 3:14-17; John 8:31-32; Acts 17:11; Heb. 4:11ff.; Eph. 4:11-16).

Dear Lord Jesus, thank You for fulfilling in our stead all righteousness and paying the just debt of our sins by Your innocent sufferings and death upon the cross. Grant us faith in You and Your cross for pardon and forgiveness and give to us a sincere and ever-growing love for You and Your Word. We ask this for the sake of Your atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world. Amen.

[Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.]

For those willing to join me in studying Luther’s Small Catechism, an excellent copy of the Catechism for study may be ordered at Luther’s Small Catechism: An Introduction to the Catholic Faith.

“For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.” Exodus 20:5-6

A key to knowing the LORD God and how He deals with man is contained in these verses of Scripture. The LORD God is a jealous God who punishes the sins of those who hate Him and rebel against Him and His commandments, even down to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Him. But He is also a merciful God who forgives the iniquities, transgressions and sins of those who, by His grace, repent and turn back to Him for mercy.

In Exodus 34, God describes Himself in these words: “The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation” (v. 6-7).

In the history recorded for us in the Bible, we can see the truthfulness of these words. When the people of Israel rebelled against the LORD, went their own way, and disobeyed His commandments, even worshipping other gods, God’s judgments fell upon them; and children and grandchildren who continued on in their sinful ways suffered the consequences, not only of their own sins but also of the sins of their fathers, when the Assyrians and the Babylonians came and destroyed their land and carried them away into captivity. On the other hand, God showed great mercy to such men as Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, Jeremiah, Daniel and others. For the sake of the promised Messiah and Savior who was yet to come, God pardoned and forgave the sins and iniquities of those who looked to Him in faith for mercy and forgiveness.

The question for you and for me today is this: “Do we want God to deal with us in His mercy or in His wrath?”

If we continue on in rebelliousness and sin against God and His commandments, we will suffer His wrath, both here and forever in eternity! But if, by the gracious calling and mercy of God, we repent of our sinful and rebellious ways, turning to Him for mercy and forgiveness for the sake of the innocent sufferings and death of Messiah Jesus in our stead, He will have mercy upon us, forgive our sins, and give us a place in His everlasting kingdom.

O LORD God, have mercy upon us and turn us from our evil thoughts, desires and ways to Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son and our Savior, for forgiveness and life eternal. Amen.

[Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.]

Though Christmas of 2019 is now history, church services and celebrations are over, gifts have been opened — some broken and others exchanged or packed away — and children are back in school and the rest of us back to full workweeks, the real reason for Christmas can bring us joy which lasts the whole year through.

Though Christmas celebrations pass quickly — sometimes even before our minds have accepted the fact that the season is upon us — the joy of the season doesn’t have to pass away or be packed away with the decorations, ornaments and gifts.

The reason for the season — which is often missed and forgotten — takes us back to ancient Bethlehem and the fields surrounding that little but, at the time, bustling city. In that city, now over 2,000 years ago, God kept the promises He had been repeating to mankind for 4,000 years. The Seed of the woman who would crush the head of Satan (Gen. 3), the Seed of Abraham who would bring blessing to all the nations of the world (Gen. 22), the Son of David and the Root of Jesse who would establish an eternal kingdom (2 Sam, 7 and Isa. 11), the Child born of the virgin who is God Himself with us (Isa. 7 and 9), the One who would suffer and die to make atonement for the sins of all people and rise again in triumph (Ps. 22, Ps. 130 and Isa. 53) and that Ruler who was to come from Bethlehem (Mic. 5) was born.

Perhaps the words of Gal. 4, summarize it best: “But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons” (v.4-5).

God fulfilled all those promises when Mary gave birth in Bethlehem and laid her child in a manger: “And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn” (Luke 2:7).

To understand the true significance of this historic event and why it offers and gives unending joy and happiness, I urge you to hear again what God Himself says of this very real and historical event through His heavenly messenger, an angel. The words of the angel to the shepherds when Jesus was born still apply today. God still tells us what this humble birth in Bethlehem is all about: “Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:10-11).

Jesus’ birth and the angel’s message are, as he says, good news of great joy for all people, for on that very day in human history, in Bethlehem, was born a Savior who is the long-promised Messiah (the Christ) and also the Lord (Jehovah God Himself in human flesh) come into this world to save us from our sin and the just condemnation we all deserve on account of our sin and disobedience.

God provided a way for sinners like me and you to be spared the just punishment we so deserve and to receive forgiveness of sins and life everlasting. Indeed, repentance and faith in Jesus is the only way (cf. John 14:6; Acts 4:12)!

Because God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son (John 3:16), the shepherds were filled with joy and, after they had gone and seen the newborn Jesus, returned glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen.

You and I too can continue to glorify and praise God — even after the Christmas season is past — for all we have heard and seen through God’s Word of Scripture, for God so loved us, He stepped into history, sending His own Son to make atonement for our sins, that we might, by repenting of our sinful ways and looking in faith to Jesus and His cross, when our place in history is done, step into eternity with Him.

God grant you Christmas joy all year long through faith in Christ Jesus, God the Son come into this world to be your Savior!

“You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.” Exodus 20:17

This commandment of the LORD teaches us that God requires not only outward holiness but inward holiness as well. Not only are our actions to be pure, but our thoughts and desires as well. Thus, we learn that we not only sin when we commit adultery or take our neighbor’s property or goods; we sin when we desire what belongs to our neighbor and is not rightfully ours.

Therefore, we are not to covet or desire our neighbor’s house, his wife, his servants or employees, his stock, or any of his property. Rather, we are to trust in the LORD God and be satisfied in Him and in that which He has given us.

The Bible teaches us: “Each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death” (James 1:14-15).

We may not realize it, but our hearts, as they are by nature, are filled with evil thoughts and desires. When we entertain these thoughts and desires, they grow and often even lead to sinful words and actions.

Jesus said, “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. These are the things which defile a man…” (Matt. 15:19-20; cf. Jer. 17:9).

This is why God warns against the sin of covetousness, for it is contrary to God’s will and desire for us and leads to acts of disobedience and rebellion. The Bible is filled with examples. David lusted after Bathsheba and took her, even committing murder to cover up his sin of adultery. King Ahab coveted Naboth’s vineyard and committed murder to get it. Judas desired money and betrayed Jesus for thirty pieces of silver.

Rather than coveting, which is idolatry and leads to death, the LORD God would have us trust in Him and be satisfied with what He gives us. The Bible tells us: “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths” (Proverbs 3:5-6; cf. Psalm 37:3-7; Col. 3:5).

From this commandment, we truly see that God commands and desires that we be holy as He is holy — in thoughts, desires, words, and deeds (cf. Lev. 19:2; Matt. 5:48). Though we have miserably failed to keep God’s holy commandments, Jesus Christ, God’s only begotten Son, has fulfilled them for us by living a holy life in thought, word and deed. He also went to the cross and bore there the full punishment for our sins that we might have God’s pardon and forgiveness and life everlasting in heaven through faith in Him.

O dearest Jesus, forgive me for my evil thoughts and desires as well as for my sinful words and actions. Cleanse my heart and give me a genuine desire to live for You. I ask this for the sake of your holy and precious blood, shed for me upon the cross. Amen.

[Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.]